The Girl and the Goalie

The family left yesterday back to Florida. We had a great time as we always do. I really enjoy spending time with them here or there. As soon as they were gone, the four of us at home felt such a sad empty silence in the house. Right then, we decided that we will make it a priority to see them more often than the 2 or 3 times a year we visit each other. We want to make sure that the kids get to share with their cousins and with their grandmother much more than they do.

We were all tired from staying up late and K woke up with a terrible cold, but I know that if they were not leaving, we would have had energy to have a great day. As it was, we just melted into chairs and beds. K tried to sleep, but couldn't. Marcos took a long nap, while The Lu and I messed with laptops while movies played on the TV in front of us. We just ignored any cleaning or chores and just hung out. We even went to bed at a regularlish hour. K and I always end up going to bed way later than we should, but hey, late night is the only time when it's quiet and there are no kid shows playing on TV.

Today we had tickets to the hockey game. One of the most awesome things about my job is that I work with people from other companies that provide equipment and support for my company's network and end users. They have nice expense accounts and access to sports and concert tickets, among other things. They help us get problems solved, move things along when needed and on occasion, take us out for a nice lunch too! Even without those perks, I enjoy working with some of these guys and am always very grateful whenever I get the chance to attend a game or event because they gave me tickets. Everyone knows that my family and I really enjoy going to the hockey games, so every once in a while, I'll be offered hockey tickets and whenever there are tickets for other sports, I let others in my group have first crack at them without me trying to hog them.

Anyway, so we had tickets for the afternoon game today. These tickets are for super-sweet, extra prime seats, about 7 or 8 rows from the penalty boxes, center ice. We also get a parking pass that gets us right into the same parking area that the players and officials use, with private entrance and everything. We got there early because they were giving free jerseys for the kids. Marcos is the latest recipient of K's cold, so neither of them were at their prime hockey-game best. Neither was I, but my excuses were that it was the 3rd straight day of cold, rainy weather; 8th day in a row since I rode a bicycle (longest period since the honeymoon cruise last month and second longest since March); the window on the van's driver's door refused to go up when we parked at the game, so we left it down and hoped for the best; and Marcos continues his "Terrible Three's" rudeness towards me (subject for a future blog entry).

As the game went on and we bought the food and treats, etc. we got more into it. It was a pretty good game with the teams going back and forth. The stands were about 60-70% full, which I guess it's kind of to be expected on a Thanksgiving Sunday afternoon. Atlanta is more of a football team than a hockey team anyway, but the arena is usually packed for hockey anyway. The Thrashers were losing by 1. The star goalie, Kari Lehtonen, was out with back problems, but Pavelec was doing a great job. In the end, we lost by 2 with the empty-net goal with 2 seconds left making the exclamation point. At least we saw a decent fight!

As soon as the buzzer sounds off the end of the game, The Lu starts crying. Not because she feels sad that her team lost, but because she feels sad FOR THEM losing and because the fans were leaving and not cheering for the Thrashers effort! This is just an example of the sweetness and big heart of The Lu. We stayed a little bit to hear the announcer call out "the stars of the game" and we cheered for them, from both teams. Then, we made our way out.

As we were leaving the arena, going by the private entrance to the parking lot, a man walks in front of us and up the same stairs to the door. I recognize him immediately and was surprised that K didn't. As we get to the door, behind him, I tell her "...don't you recognize him? That's Kari Lehtonen, the goalie!" K and The Lu get very excited and, as we walk behind him to our car, he stops at his car and I say "Hope to see you back on the ice soon" and he says "Yeah...". So then, K asks him if he wouldn't mind taking a picture with The Lu. You could tell that he wasn't terribly happy about his team not winning and he not being able to play and perhaps make a difference, but he did not hesitate for a second from saying "Yeah, no problem", and posing with The Lu for the camera.




Needless to say, that made The Lu's day much more than the whole game experience did. It made mine to, just seeing how excited both my girls were.

To put a nice exclamation point on the whole outing, as we get in the van and I get ready to drive home with the window down in 40 degree rainy weather, I try the window and it rolled up as if to say "You really can't have a bad time with your family at the hockey game".